


Scars

by GallifreyisBurning



Series: Drarry Drabbles and Prompt Fics [9]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Hopeful Ending, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, M/M, Post-War, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 11:09:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29900199
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GallifreyisBurning/pseuds/GallifreyisBurning
Summary: CW: mentions of self harm and alcohol abuse
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Series: Drarry Drabbles and Prompt Fics [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2011204
Comments: 2
Kudos: 20





	Scars

**Author's Note:**

> CW: mentions of self harm and alcohol abuse

The first time Voldemort fell, the marks branded onto the arms of his followers faded to nothing but a dull grey—a shadow of what they had once been. As he strengthened, they darkened. When he rose, they burned. And when he died, they disappeared into the ether as though they—as though _he_ —had never been.

But Draco could still feel it, lingering beneath his skin, pulsing through his veins—a darkness that would not fade, an evil that would not die. His skin might be blank, but he knew, at the core of himself, that his soul was forever tainted.

He marked himself, instead—to remember, to punish, to feel. To purge the darkness that crawled through every artery until he felt like he would burst from the pressure. Stinging lines of red, a map of his sins scrawled across flesh that was clear and white but didn’t deserve to be.

—

The first time Voldemort met Harry, they both survived, but they both lost parts of themselves. The final time they met, they both died, and their pieces scattered and rearranged. When Harry returned, with his death etched across his chest, everyone hailed him as the hero that had saved them all, and they called him golden, and they thought him whole.

But Harry knew better, knew that the souls of those lost because he hadn’t been enough trailed behind him like chains, knew that everything inside him was grey and fragmented, knew that pieces of himself had been trapped on the other side, leaving him empty and raw.

He filled the gaping chasm with burning liquor that allowed the chains to float, that hid the grey under hazy amber, that dulled the sharp edges where parts of him had been ripped out in the shapes of the people he’d loved and could not save. At least for a while.

—

The first year that Draco and Harry spent together at Hogwarts, they saw each other as rivals. They schemed and fought and thought they knew hate, and they crashed against each other like waves in a stormy sea. 

When they returned to Hogwarts for the final time, they saw each other as mirrors, reflecting back their own wounds. They were battered and broken and they knew, now, what hate really looked like, and they chose to bury it with their dead.

One of them was overflowing, his regret uncontainable. The other was empty, his grief fathomless. But in each other they found balance. Eventually, their painful edges melded seamlessly, soldered by a cleansing fire of forgiveness and second chances, and they glowed in the flames, melting and reforming and healing, and together they rose as something new.

**Author's Note:**

> If you liked this, there’s a [tumblr](https://gallifrey1sburning.tumblr.com/post/645008075067097088/scars) post that you can reblog ❤️


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